A LONELY RIDE
As I stepped into the Slumgullion stage I saw that it was a dark night,a lonely road, and that I was the only passenger. Let me assure thereader that I have no ulterior design in making this assertion. Along course of light reading has forewarned me what every experiencedintelligence must confidently look for from such a statement. Thestoryteller who willfully tempts Fate by such obvious beginnings; who isto the expectant reader in danger of being robbed or half-murdered, orfrightened by an escaped lunatic, or introduced to his ladylove for thefirst time, deserves to be detected. I am relieved to say that none ofthese things occurred to me. The road from Wingdam to Slumgullion knewno other banditti than the regularly licensed hotelkeepers; lunatics hadnot yet reached such depth of imbecility as to ride of their own freewill in California stages; and my Laura, amiable and long-suffering asshe always is, could not, I fear, have borne up against these depressingcircumstances long enough to have made the slightest impression on me.
I stood with my shawl and carpetbag in hand, gazing doubtingly on thevehicle. Even in the darkness the red dust of Wingdam was visible on itsroof and sides, and the red slime of Slumgullion clung tenaciously toits wheels. I opened the door; the stage creaked easily, and in thegloomy abyss the swaying straps beckoned me, like ghostly hands, to comein now and have my sufferings out at once.
I must not omit to mention the occurrence of a circumstance which struckme as appalling and mysterious. A lounger on the steps of the hotel,who I had reason to suppose was not in any way connected with the stagecompany, gravely descended, and walking toward the conveyance, triedthe handle of the door, opened it, expectorated in the carriage, andreturned to the hotel with a serious demeanor. Hardly had he resumedhis position when another individual, equally disinterested, impassivelywalked down the steps, proceeded to the back of the stage, lifted it,expectorated carefully on the axle, and returned slowly and pensively tothe hotel. A third spectator wearily disengaged himself from one ofthe Ionic columns of the portico and walked to the box, remained for amoment in serious and expectorative contemplation of the boot, and thenreturned to his column. There was something so weird in this baptismthat I grew quite nervous.
Perhaps I was out of spirits. A number of infinitesimal annoyances,winding up with the resolute persistency of the clerk at the stageoffice to enter my name misspelt on the waybill, had not predisposedme to cheerfulness. The inmates of the Eureka House, from a socialviewpoint, were not attractive. There was the prevailing opinion--socommon to many honest people--that a serious style of deportment andconduct toward a stranger indicates high gentility and elevated station.Obeying this principle, all hilarity ceased on my entrance to supper,and general remark merged into the safer and uncompromising chronicle ofseveral bad cases of diphtheria, then epidemic at Wingdam. When I leftthe dining-room, with an odd feeling that I had been supping exclusivelyon mustard and tea leaves, I stopped a moment at the parlor door. Apiano, harmoniously related to the dinner bell, tinkled responsive toa diffident and uncertain touch. On the white wall the shadow of anold and sharp profile was bending over several symmetrical and shadowycurls. "I sez to Mariar, Mariar, sez I, 'Praise to the face is opendisgrace.'" I heard no more. Dreading some susceptibility to sincereexpression on the subject of female loveliness, I walked away, checkingthe compliment that otherwise might have risen unbidden to my lips, andhave brought shame and sorrow to the household.
It was with the memory of these experiences resting heavily upon me thatI stood hesitatingly before the stage door. The driver, about to mount,was for a moment illuminated by the open door of the hotel. He hadthe wearied look which was the distinguishing expression of Wingdam.Satisfied that I was properly waybilled and receipted for, he took nofurther notice of me. I looked longingly at the box seat, but he didnot respond to the appeal. I flung my carpetbag into the chasm, divedrecklessly after it, and--before I was fairly seated--with a greatsigh, a creaking of unwilling springs, complaining bolts, and harshlyexpostulating axle, we moved away. Rather the hotel door slipped behind,the sound of the piano sank to rest, and the night and its shadows movedsolemnly upon us.
To say it was dark expressed but faintly the pitchy obscuritythat encompassed the vehicle. The roadside trees were scarcelydistinguishable as deeper masses of shadow; I knew them only by thepeculiar sodden odor that from time to time sluggishly flowed in at theopen window as we rolled by. We proceeded slowly; so leisurely that,leaning from the carriage, I more than once detected the fragrant sighof some astonished cow, whose ruminating repose upon the highway wehad ruthlessly disturbed. But in the darkness our progress, more theguidance of some mysterious instinct than any apparent volition ofour own, gave an indefinable charm of security to our journey that amoment's hesitation or indecision on the part of the driver would havedestroyed.
I had indulged a hope that in the empty vehicle I might obtain that restso often denied me in its crowded condition. It was a weak delusion.When I stretched out my limbs it was only to find that the ordinaryconveniences for making several people distinctly uncomfortable weredistributed throughout my individual frame. At last, resting my armson the straps, by dint of much gymnastic effort I became sufficientlycomposed to be aware of a more refined species of torture. The springsof the stage, rising and falling regularly, produced a rhythmical beatwhich began to absorb my attention painfully. Slowly this thumpingmerged into a senseless echo of the mysterious female ofthe hotel parlor, and shaped itself into this awful andbenumbing axiom--"Praise-to-the-face-is-open-disgrace.Praise-to-the-face-is-open-disgrace." Inequalities of the road onlyquickened its utterance or drawled it to an exasperating length.
It was of no use to consider the statement seriously. It was of nouse to except to it indignantly. It was of no use to recall the manyinstances where praise to the face had redounded to the everlastinghonor of praiser and bepraised; of no use to dwell sentimentallyon modest genius and courage lifted up and strengthened by opencommendation; of no use to except to the mysterious female, to pictureher as rearing a thin-blooded generation on selfish and mechanicallyrepeated axioms--all this failed to counteract the monotonous repetitionof this sentence. There was nothing to do but to give in--and I wasabout to accept it weakly, as we too often treat other illusions ofdarkness and necessity, for the time being, when I became aware of someother annoyance that had been forcing itself upon me for the last fewmoments. How quiet the driver was!
Was there any driver? Had I any reason to suppose that he was not lyinggagged and bound on the roadside, and the highwayman with blackened facewho did the thing so quietly driving me--whither? The thing is perfectlyfeasible. And what is this fancy now being jolted out of me? A story?It's of no use to keep it back--particularly in this abysmal vehicle,and here it comes: I am a Marquis--a French Marquis; French, becausethe peerage is not so well known, and the country is better adapted toromantic incident--a Marquis, because the democratic reader delights inthe nobility. My name is something LIGNY. I am coming from Paris to mycountry seat at St. Germain. It is a dark night, and I fall asleepand tell my honest coachman, Andre, not to disturb me, and dream of anangel. The carriage at last stops at the chateau. It is so dark thatwhen I alight I do not recognize the face of the footman who holds thecarriage door. But what of that?--PESTE! I am heavy with sleep. The sameobscurity also hides the old familiar indecencies of the statues on theterrace; but there is a door, and it opens and shuts behind me smartly.Then I find myself in a trap, in the presence of the brigand who hasquietly gagged poor Andre and conducted the carriage thither. Thereis nothing for me to do, as a gallant French Marquis, but to say,"PARBLEU!" draw my rapier, and die valorously! I am found a week or twoafter outside a deserted cabaret near the barrier, with a hole throughmy ruffled linen and my pockets stripped. No; on second thoughts, Iam rescued--rescued by the angel I have been dreaming of, who is theassumed daughter of the brigand but the real daughter of an intimatefriend.
Looking from the window again, in the vain hope of distinguishing thedriver, I found my ey
es were growing accustomed to the darkness. Icould see the distant horizon, defined by India-inky woods, relieving alighter sky. A few stars widely spaced in this picture glimmered sadly.I noticed again the infinite depth of patient sorrow in their serenefaces; and I hope that the vandal who first applied the flippant"twinkle" to them may not be driven melancholy-mad by their reproachfuleyes. I noticed again the mystic charm of space that imparts a senseof individual solitude to each integer of the densest constellation,involving the smallest star with immeasurable loneliness. Something ofthis calm and solitude crept over me, and I dozed in my gloomy cavern.When I awoke the full moon was rising. Seen from my window, it had anindescribably unreal and theatrical effect. It was the full moon ofNORMA--that remarkable celestial phenomenon which rises so palpably toa hushed audience and a sublime andante chorus, until the CASTA DIVA issung--the "inconstant moon" that then and thereafter remains fixed inthe heavens as though it were a part of the solar system inauguratedby Joshua. Again the white-robed Druids filed past me, again I saw thatimprobable mistletoe cut from that impossible oak, and again cold chillsran down my back with the first strain of the recitative. The thumpingsprings essayed to beat time, and the private-box-like obscurity ofthe vehicle lent a cheap enchantment to the view. But it was a vastimprovement upon my past experience, and I hugged the fond delusion.
My fears for the driver were dissipated with the rising moon. A familiarsound had assured me of his presence in the full possession of at leastone of his most important functions. Frequent and full expectorationconvinced me that his lips were as yet not sealed by the gag ofhighwaymen, and soothed my anxious ear. With this load lifted from mymind, and assisted by the mild presence of Diana, who left, as whenshe visited Endymion, much of her splendor outside my cavern--I lookedaround the empty vehicle. On the forward seat lay a woman's hairpin. Ipicked it up with an interest that, however, soon abated. There was noscent of the roses to cling to it still, not even of hair oil. Nobend or twist in its rigid angles betrayed any trait of its wearer'scharacter. I tried to think that it might have been "Mariar's." I triedto imagine that, confining the symmetrical curls of that girl, it mighthave heard the soft compliments whispered in her ears which provoked thewrath of the aged female. But in vain. It was reticent and unswerving inits upright fidelity, and at last slipped listlessly through my fingers.
I had dozed repeatedly--waked on the threshold of oblivion bycontact with some of the angles of the coach, and feeling that I wasunconsciously assuming, in imitation of a humble insect of my childishrecollection, that spherical shape which could best resist thoseimpressions, when I perceived that the moon, riding high in the heavens,had begun to separate the formless masses of the shadowy landscape.Trees isolated, in clumps and assemblages, changed places beforemy window. The sharp outlines of the distant hills came back, asin daylight, but little softened in the dry, cold, dewless air of aCalifornia summer night. I was wondering how late it was, and thinkingthat if the horses of the night traveled as slowly as the team beforeus, Faustus might have been spared his agonizing prayer, when a suddenspasm of activity attacked my driver. A succession of whip-snappings,like a pack of Chinese crackers, broke from the box before me. The stageleaped forward, and when I could pick myself from under the seat, a longwhite building had in some mysterious way rolled before my window.It must be Slumgullion! As I descended from the stage I addressed thedriver:
"I thought you changed horses on the road?"
"So we did. Two hours ago."
"That's odd. I didn't notice it."
"Must have been asleep, sir. Hope you had a pleasant nap. Bully placefor a nice quiet snooze--empty stage, sir!"